Questions & Answers about Mă spăl pe genunchiul drept.
Why is mă used when the English translation says 'I wash', not 'I wash myself'?
Why do we use the word pe (on) before the knee?
Where is the word for 'my'? The translation says 'my right knee' but I don't see a word like meu.
Romanian rarely uses possessive words (like 'my' or 'your') for body parts. Because you already said mă (myself), it is obvious whose knee it is! Instead of 'my', Romanian just uses the definite article 'the', so it translates to 'I wash myself on the right knee'.
What is the base word for 'knee' here, and how does it change to genunchiul?
The dictionary word for 'knee' is the masculine noun genunchi. Because the sentence needs to say 'the knee', we attach the masculine definite article -ul to the very end of the word, creating genunchiul.